KARACHI: An American judge has sentenced a Pakistani American woman affiliated with the Muttahida Quami Movement (MQM) party to eight years in prison for giving false statements to the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) about her involvement in a “terrorism” plot, the US attorney’s office in Texas said. 

According to the US attorney’s office in Texas, Kahkashan Haider Khan, 54, is a member of the Karachi-based MQM party. She pleaded guilty to false statements in relation to “international terrorism” and was sentenced to 96 months in federal prison by US District Judge Amos L. Mazzant on Oct. 7. 

The report by US attorney’s office said Khan lied to FBI agents about her involvement in the planned fire-bombing of two gas stations in Karachi in 2023. Khan, a US citizen who immigrated from Pakistan, served as a recruiter and facilitator of “terrorist actions” in Pakistan by collecting funds, sending them to Pakistan and arranging and paying for violent actions in the country, it said. 

“We will not allow the United States to be a launching point for terrorist attacks abroad,” Acting US Attorney Jay R. Combs said in a statement issued by his office on Nov. 14. “Vigilantly protecting the United States and its interests is inherent in everything we do. This includes aggressively prosecuting those who wrongly believe that they can find safe harbor in the United States while plotting crimes elsewhere.”

The US attorney’s office said Khan recruited an individual in Pakistan in January 2023 to conduct fire-bombings on two “Punjabi-owned gas stations” in Karachi. It said the MQM activist discussed multiple aspects of the plan with her co-conspirator in Pakistan, including selecting the target locations, discussing which flammable accelerants to use and how to escape after the attacks. 

The report said Khan also arranged for her co-conspirator to buy two firearms to be used by the attackers to ensure their success, adding that she collected money from MQM sympathizers in the US and wired the funds to Pakistan to pay for the attacks.

The US attorney’s office said Khan’s co-conspirator sent her photos from news coverage of a fire-bombing of a Karachi gas station on Feb. 20, 2023, caused by attackers throwing something from a vehicle resulting in six people being burned. It said Khan celebrated the news and told her Pakistani co-conspirator that he would be “greatly rewarded” for his work. 

The report said Khan scoured the news for reports of the fire-bombing that day but could fine none. 

“After approximately one day of searching, she discovered that the photos her co-conspirator sent were from an event that occurred in October of 2022,” the US attorney’s office said. “Khan was furious and accused her co-conspirator of deceit and being a disgrace to the MQM movement.”

The statement said FBI’s special agents interviewed Khan in February 2024 about the incident at her home. During the interview, Khan made multiple false statements about the events and lied about her involvement in the attempted attacks. Khan also denied she wanted a co-conspirator to commit the fire-bombings in Pakistan but later admitted to her involvement. 

“During her plea hearing in February 2025, Khan admitted that these were false statements made knowing that the statements were material to a terrorism investigation,” the statement said. 

Khan has made headlines in Pakistan previously. In March 2021, officials of Pakistan’s paramilitary Rangers force and the Counter-Terrorism Department (CTD) accused her of plotting the assassination of various personalities to trigger sectarian violence in Karachi. 

The CTD accused her of establishing target killers’ groups in collaboration with India’s intelligence agency Research and Analysis Wing (RAW) and anti-Pakistan Sindhi and Baloch groups to target law enforcement agencies, police, political and religious leaders in Karachi. Khan had denied the allegations. 

The MQM was founded by party leader Altaf Hussain in 1984, who turned it into a significant force in Pakistan’s Karachi before going into self-imposed exile in London in the early 1990s. He continued to manage it remotely for the next three decades, with the MQM winning several elections in the city during this period.

The party’s leaders and supporters have been frequently accused of running militant wings in Karachi, carrying out targeted killings of political rivals and engaging in street violence and extortion. The party and Hussain have always denied these allegations. 

Hussain’s political fortunes nosedived in August 2016 when he made a controversial speech which was deemed as anti-Pakistan, and triggered a crackdown which led to the arrest of party supporters and the sealing of the MQM headquarters in Karachi.